Comment 25 by Coel

The Catholic position permitting belief in evolution has later endorsed by John Paul II. But note that even now it is a grudging acceptance, they don't endorse evolution, just permit belief in it.

Exactly. You could be a creationist and still be a good Catholic, and by "creationist", I mean in the very broad sense that you could believe that all living forms were separately created by God more or less in their present form. I would even say that you could believe that the Earth was 10,000 years old and still be on solid theological grounds in the Catholic Church. I see nowhere in Catholic theology that would specifically disallow a literal meaning of Genesis, besides a general rule that believers cannot believe in anything "contrary to reason" (which might be the biggest oxymoron in history, but I digress).

Unlike its fundamentalist, literalist brethren, the Catholic Church's method of biblical interpretation allows more a little more flexibility to incorporate observations of the natural world. But this is not the same thing as endorsement of specific scientific beliefs.